It is usually required that particles are uniformly packed to a vessel, such as a reaction vessel, a storage silo, etc. Catalysts are used for the composition and decomposition in various chemical reactions. For example, in the petroleum industry, particulate solid catalysts are used in the reaction of decomposing heavy gas oil as the raw material into gasoline with high octane numbers by the use of a catalyst, in the reaction of causing desulfurization and decomposition simultaneously by the use of a catalyst in the presence of hydrogen, etc. In such reactions, catalysts are packed in the reaction vessel, and it is known that the packed state of the catalysts influences the efficiency of the operations.
As a packing apparatus for packing catalysts, a Densi Cat system packing apparatus, an UOP system packing apparatus and a COP system packing apparatus are conventionally known. In the Densi Cat system packing apparatus, a plurality of rubber blades are used to spray particles uniformly in omni-direction based on an opening of the blades and diffusion by the blades. In the UOP system packing apparatus, particles are sprayed by using the centrifugal force of 2 to 4 straight blades. In the COP system packing apparatus, 1 to 3 layer blades having guides on elliptical plates are used to spray particles (refer to FIGS. 12 to 14 of Patent Reference 1).
As a conventional packing apparatus, for example, a packing apparatus including catalyst distribution sections each having at least 2 distribution plates arranged parallel with each other below a catalyst supply pipe, the distribution plates being coaxially rotated, the upper plate having a larger diameter than the lower plate, each plate having the surface partitioned with a plurality of ribs so as to expand radially outward, the catalyst distribution sections having radially lengths different from each other; and a catalyst dropping section having a central cylinder passed through the center of the upper distribution plate to the proximity of the lower distribution plate, and an elliptic hole passed through the upper and the lower sides of the lowermost distribution plate and extended radially from the center is known (refer to Patent Reference 2).